only by the stars
by Mia-Zeklos
Summary: "A dyad in the Force - a phenomenon that occurs when two Force-sensitive beings share a unique Force-bond with each other, connecting their minds across space and time." One morning, months into her self-imposed exile, Rey wakes up in Luke Skywalker's Jedi Temple, ten years into the past.
1. Chapter 1

**Notes: Title from Of Monsters and Men's _Human_.**

**This has probably been done a billion times already, but I wouldn't know, so here's my take on it. I do have a solid outline and this will probably have around five chapters. The ending will go up, most likely, as I'm actually quite intent on the smut this time around. A lot of this is mainly character study of both Ben and Rey, with the plot wrapped around that. Hope you guys enjoy it and, as always, feedback is most welcome!**

* * *

When Rey opens her eyes, the world around her is drowning in green.

_Oh, no._ She _knows_ this feeling. Knows the sensation of being entirely entrenched in the Force; in another presence that she recognises even in her dreams by now – _only_ in her dreams, given that it's the only way. So this is a dream. It has to be. The connection can't have opened again if there's no one on the other side and the familiarity of it with that knowledge in mind is suffocating. _No, no, no_.

"Ben? Are you seeing this?"

"Yes, keep it up." Rey struggles up to her elbows and looks around blearily, focusing with some alarm on the giant, seemingly floating tree right above her head as its roots disentangle from the ground completely. The wielder, a human girl with her back to her, tenses in anticipation before she tries to straighten it back up. "And when you're done, put it back _exactly_ how it was. You know what Master Skywalker says about needless destruction."

He sounds distracted – he must have felt the Force opening the space between them too, but he couldn't possibly recognise it for what it is. _Master Skywalker_. This isn't a life after death, then. A vision? A memory? Neither had really happened this way before, not to this degree, but the only other option is too strange to entertain.

No, not too strange. Too _hopeful_.

"Ben?"

Several things happen at once – the girl yelps and loses her focus, Rey raises a startled, sluggish hand to try and stop the tree's descent, and the tree in question falls apart to smithereens a moment later.

"What are you doing? I could have killed you!" The girl looks equal parts angry and horrified, but it's not the outburst that shocks her the most – no, it's the fact that she's talking to her _at all_.

"You can see me?"

"Of course I can see you! Could have used a bit of a warning."

"I'm sorry, I—" She finally sits up, rubbing a hand across her eyes as if it's going to chase the confusion away. The little pocket universe that the bond opening usually seems to bring with itself doesn't work anymore, now that its regular rules are broken. It only makes sense, Rey supposes – after all, it's not timeless anymore. Rather, it had moved _her_ in time. "There's someone here I need to talk to."

"You're in for a disappointment," Ben's voice floats over to her as he approaches them, the permanent tension etched over his features shifting quickly into irritation. The sight of him makes her freeze, but he's undeterred. "No one here is allowed visitations. How did you even find this place?" He doesn't wait for a response and extends a hand towards her, frown deepening when she doesn't take the offer. "Are you all right?"

"I am." She can't touch him. If she does, this— whatever it is is going to tear at the seams and vanish, and she can't have that. As long as she keeps him talking, he'll stay. It's worked _before_, after all. "I needed to talk to _you_."

"Do I know you?"

"Not— yet." _That's_ _promising_. She doesn't _sound_ all right, Rey can tell, and the two would-be Jedi exchange a look. She feels unbalanced and disoriented and not up to making a particular amount of sense unless forced to. And she will be forced to, soon enough, if she wants to let him know of their circumstances. "I know you."

_Now_ he's confused. The girl is the first to speak. "You can take it to Master Skywalker, if you'd like."

"No," Ben cuts in, a panicked edge to his voice. "No, it's— I can handle this. We don't need to bother him. Let the children have their day with their Master."

"It's all right if it's for an emergency."

"Does this look like an emergency? It's one of her against fifteen of us at the Temple." Rey nearly scoffs. It's him all right. He might not be the Ben she knows yet, but this sort of flippant confidence would be displaced on anyone else. "I can _handle_ this, Mack. Why don't you tell the others to get ready for dinner? I'll be right back."

"Okay." The girl – _Mack_ – had assessed them both with her eyes and had clearly decided that the newcomer presented no danger. Just as well – Rey could use the privacy. Just as she makes to leave, Ben calls after her again.

"They don't need to know about this, all right? It's not that important."

She narrows her eyes at him, as if fighting some invisible impulse and _oh_, Rey knows the feeling all too well. Finally, though, she buckles. "It's not that important."

"Just forget about it."

"I will." It certainly sounds like it. "See you at dinner, Ben."

Rey waits until she's out of earshot before she speaks again. "You didn't need to do that. She would have trusted your judgement."

"I can't risk any of this being rattled off to Luke before I figure it out myself." When he sees that she has no intention of getting up off the forest floor, Ben lowers himself to the ground, only to continue his fidgeting there. "Listen— Is this about Senator Kalegare? Because I've said this already, and he was the only one to blame. I _warned_ him that lightsabers are not toys and that he shouldn't goad younglings into using one near him while he treats this place like a tourist attraction. Luke said so too. If they couldn't sew his finger back on, that's not my fault. My mother can keep apologising until his ears bleed, but I won't. He should have known better."

"What? No." His nervousness makes sense now and curiosity pushes it out of the way as soon as the denial is out of her mouth. She might have been a little more disapproving if she hadn't seen him do much worse, but as it is, the visual nearly makes her laugh. "I'm not here about any— severed Senator fingers. I don't know _how_ I'm here, actually."

He raises an eyebrow in response and Rey can feel him pawing at the Force surrounding them, looking for the source of her. It's strange, seeing him like this – like he's not quite finished yet. It's that same face she knows so well, that same presence in the back of her mind, but it's unlike any signal she's received from his general direction before. After the Death Star, the _lightness_ of him had almost made her giddy; the way he'd snapped his shackles clean off just before the end. It's not the same now. There's a darkness weighing him in place, dragging him down by the ankles bit by bit, but it's not tearing him apart just yet. He's not using it to torment more power out of himself – hasn't been taught how, more like – but the possibility is there, lurking in those dark eyes.

It's not quite Ben Solo looking back at her, but it's a far cry from Kylo Ren.

His sharp intake of breath breaks through her reverie and Rey tenses at the realisation that he'd been looking through her mind for a source of this newest puzzle. "I know that name."

"Don't _do_ that," she snaps, frantically pushing any boundary she can muster between them and pulling it as far up as it would go. It's not much use – the bond, traitorous as always, curls around them both and shows him everything he's asking for. "You don't understand."

"No, I don't." He's amazed at the mechanics of it; she can tell as much already. There's a small smile playing at his lips, a mirror of the one he'd given her when he had been trying to figure out the mechanics of the bond for the first time. It's a childlike sort of fascination and it makes her heart painfully stutter over its own rhythm. "You're saying you come from the future."

"I didn't _say_ anything."

"_My_ future."

She might as well have been trying to argue the morality of the privacy of thought with a brick wall, but then again, that's not precisely new. "Yes."

"I really shouldn't look, then." _You shouldn't look **anyway**_, she wants to say, but saves her breath instead – in just a few years, he'll be doing it as easily as breathing anyway.

Unless...

"In the future," Rey starts instead, the same desperate hope that had taken over her when she'd first woken up raising its ugly head again, "we have a connection. That's what you're feeling now. We can communicate across space— and across time, now, I suppose. You called it a dyad. A dyad in the Force."

"A dyad." He tests the word in his mouth and reaches out, hand dropping when she inches away from him. "Does it have any limitations?"

"Not many. I could touch you, and vice versa." She's the one to initiate it this time and her fingers brush over his. The bond surges up, but it doesn't feel as explosive as it had before – it's like there's less of a strain on it, now that they're in the same place. It's a terrifying thought, the dawning comprehension that it has melted so deep into their very beings that there's no stepping out of it now, but the fact that it had happened when it had sent her back in time is yet another bit of encouragement that she doesn't really need. "We could come in contact with inanimate objects around each other, too. We could never see each other's surroundings, and no one around us could see the other. That was about it."

"But you're visible _now_." He's making a conscious effort to stay away from her mind now – it's nearly palpable – but his interest is still pushing at her boundaries, curling around her like a snake. She can't blame him; had someone told her five years ago that they come from her personal future, she would have been dying to know what they knew too, especially if it were _him_. Then again, his life in the past seems a whole lot more eventful than hers had been. "Which means you might be here for good. If you are, it's because the Force willed it, no question about that. The Force must have been the one to create this bond to begin with. But _why_? What would make affecting the future so important?"

"I might have a few ideas." The thought all by itself is enough to make her head spin. She'd been resolute in her decision to stay away from everything and everyone for the rest of her life in the hopes that her presence wouldn't be the cause of yet more trouble; that she would finally break a cycle that seemed to have started decades – centuries, possibly – before she'd even been born. And yet, with this opportunity presenting itself so clearly, the urge to do something is irresistible. Perhaps she can't change all of it, can't save all the lives that had been lost, but she can save _him_. It's been a different kind of emptiness; the lack of him, alive and breathing, as a steady presence in her soul. She hadn't realised just how bad it had become until he had come to fill that space again, but it's like a breath of fresh air after months and months under the unforgiving heat of Tatooine and it's horrible, risking the future of the galaxy to save herself, but she'd been so _alone_. The Force had shoved this opportunity at her and now it's impossible to let it go when he's right here, so full of life.

"It would be a risk," he acknowledges, but there's something hungry even about his warning, as if he's just as eager to see the result as he would be to see time itself splitting apart on their whim. His mind pushes against the bond – yet another test – and he grins. It's more than a little sinister and it lacks the warmth she'd caught a glimpse of right before he'd left her, but it only makes sense – she's a stranger to him. He's a stranger to her, too, and the thought unsettles her somewhat before she manages to school her features back into something resembling neutrality. It's no point encouraging him further, especially since she'll have to stay if she wants to change the course of history. It's something to do, certainly, and for the first time in what feels like forever, Rey feels up to the task. "You could travel the galaxy until you pinpoint the moment when you disappear from your home and then go back to your own life; you don't have to play with the passing of time. If you stay, it could change things completely."

"I'm counting on that." If she sounds a little desperate, it's because she is. He doesn't know her yet, but he knows she's telling the truth; it has to count for something. If she manages to steer it all away from the approaching disaster, the magnitude of it might just be enough to save the world – her world most of all – from falling apart.

"It's strange that you ended up here now," Ben says after a short silence and she can see that he's lost in his head again by the hesitation in his eyes; as if the giddy warmth that the scarce knowledge of his future that she'd brought had evaporated in favour of suspicion. It's unfounded, given the bond's steady presence between their minds, but, "I've been thinking—"

It's right there, unfurling in front of her – the conflict in him. It's not yet time for him to turn, but it has to be close. It makes her stand on edge; this sudden responsibility she can feel rising inside her. Damn the Force for doing this to them, for showing her yet another way out when she'd seen none, for making yet another last-moment effort to shift the tide. _He's our last hope_, she had told Luke a year ago and about ten years into the future, and it rings truer than ever now. He seems aimless most of all, clueless about the place he's expected to take into the world, and it's nearly enough to break her heart. She might not have all the answers, but surely pointing him in the right direction couldn't hurt. Why else had she been sent here?

It's insanity, but what's one more in the string of insanities she'd committed to for him? Nothing. Nothing when compared to the possibility of being given this one last chance. "You've been thinking?"

The darkness chasing at his heels seems to retract at the sight of her, if only by a fraction. "It's nothing. All right," he adds as he gets up, offering her his hand again. "You can stay with me. No one else can know about this, least of all Luke. If you really are from my future, you know how he is; he'll only complicate things further. I want to know more – about the future, about this connection. I want to see what change will feel like. And then, I want you to tell me _everything_."

Despite the resentment rising inside her at his imperious tone, Rey intertwines her fingers with his to get to her feet. "How would we know change feels like anything? I could have already done it and you'd be none the wiser."

She thinks back to Tatooine and to a long life filled with the fear of her own abilities. Thinks about his life coursing through her veins, white-hot and piercingly bright right before he'd faded from her grasp. Thinks of the shapeless, endless grief that's been hanging over her for months and the desperate quest for some relief. Finally, the Force had listened when she'd called. If they have to do this all over again, they won't be alone this time. And if it can be avoided altogether...

She's getting ahead of herself, Rey realises. What happens now is what will stick. She'll make sure to make the most of it, for both their sakes. For the rest of the galaxy too, if they manage it.

"Yes," Ben agrees with an ease she's not sure she's ever heard from him before. Letting go of him feels like giving up when he disentangles their hands, even if he's not going anywhere. She'll make sure of that this time around. "I wouldn't be surprised if you have."


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes: In which Ben faces the mortifying ordeal of realising he has an actual future.**

* * *

It's already past sundown by the time they make their way back to the temple. It's not much of a surprise – the day had been coming to an end when the newcomer in the forest had appeared out of thin air and asking his string of questions and figuring out a place for her to stay had taken what little of it had been left and as Ben leads her towards the huts that precede the main building, he begins to wonder how he could possibly hope to pull this off.

It's strange; this connection that the Force had opened between them. Abrupt, but natural in a way that nothing else had ever been so far. Her presence in his mind, scarce as it is as she tries to keep the future's secrets at bay, is a welcome one, nearly comforting in how _easy_ it seems to be already. What _is_ uncomfortable is the realisation itself and it makes his stomach clench with the worst kind of guilt, sickly and heavy, as he tries to suppress the thought. It's never easy when people try to reach him through his mind. It isn't that easy with— with anyone else who's wandered around in there, really.

"Oh!" She says, abruptly stopping their descent down the hill by tightening her hold on his hand to get him to face her. She's yet to let go and it makes sense, Ben supposes – she needs him to show her the way in the darkness around them – but there's a frantic edge to it that worries him. "I forgot— I'm Rey."

_I know_. Little pieces of her had been laid out in her thoughts for him when he'd tried to breach them before and while it's not enough for him to get the full picture, it's enough. She's hopeful and alone and strong with the Force and rather persistent, from what he'd been able to glean, both from the bond between them and the fact that she's here at all. There's a spark of determination in her eyes when she looks at him, mixed up with a peculiar sort of devastation. It's an unfamiliar thing; seeing someone be careful not because they're afraid of setting him off but because he might just disappear if she makes the wrong move. She must have deemed it a risk worth taking if she keeps meddling with past events and _that_ only serves to make it more confusing. Time travel is such an unexplored aspect of the Universe's inner workings that any attempts to handle it harmlessly had failed rather spectacularly and yet here she is, meeting someone from her own timeline for the first time, years into his past.

Yes, definitely persistent. Powerful. Calculating, as if she's trying it out for the first time in an otherwise chaotic life. Overflowing with life and light and a sort of beauty that he can't quite put into words with the way it brushes over the essence of him like a caress. Somewhat impatient and infinitely curious. _Rey_.

"Just Rey?"

She considers two different truths that he can't quite force into shape before settling for a third one. "Just Rey." Her gaze sharpens and he wonders, fleetingly, what he'd done in the future to provoke it. "Does it matter?"

"No. It _might_ have helped," he adds when her suspicion doesn't lessen, "with figuring out your homeworld."

"Jakku," she says immediately, as if she knows it'll be of no help at all. "I— I travelled for a while after that. I was living on Tatooine before ending up here."

"You must like it in the desert." He supposes he can understand – Luke had taken him on missions on desert planets before and they seem to keep all kinds of treasures if one knows where to look. Rey, it would appear, either doesn't know where to look or doesn't find treasure hunts particularly exciting, if the grimace that follows is anything to go by.

"No. The place, its history, means a lot to me, but— no. I hate it there." From the looks of it – as she glances away, clearly afraid she'd revealed too much, a hint of terror sneaks into her eyes, a sure sign of a denial coming to the surface – it's the first time she's admitting as much to herself. "I hate it _so_ much."

Ben shifts a little into the death grip she's got on his hand; intertwines their fingers to offer any encouragement she might need to continue. "Were you alone? Back on Tatooine?"

_Yes. It would have been easier with you there but you couldn't and no one else understands and I can't go back I can't allow any more damage I can't let this continue I can't _"Will you stop doing this?"

"I'm not doing anything." She might as well have started yelling in his face; that's how overwhelming it all feels. She's trying to hide it desperately enough that it ends up blasted straight into his head instead. If she wants to keep the future safe, he might have to start teaching her how to keep her thoughts locked away even when she's not making a conscious effort.

"You're fishing for information, that's what you're doing. It's exhausting." A lot of things are exhausting where the two of them are involved, apparently, and she inflicts the sentiment upon him a moment later. "You keep digging through my mind as if _I'm_ being difficult. I'm here because I want to help. For your sake, and mine, and the rest of the galaxy too, if we can get that far."

"And changing our path away from whatever direction you're trying to avoid will help with that? It'll make the galaxy a better place?" It's a thrilling thought, whether he'd like to own up to it or not. Being the first Jedi Knight trained after the fall of the Empire is bound to make him a notable figure, Ben would bet, but he hadn't expected anything of this scale; not truly. The path of the Jedi had always seemed like a reclusive, isolated one. Going back to the rest of the world had always been an enticing possibility, even if he'd always kept any such notions firmly locked away in Luke's presence.

"It could. I hope so." It's so dark by now that he can barely make out the shape of her, but she's still determinedly looking away. How much of a mess could they have made if she can't even face him? "There are too many things playing a part in all of it for me to know. But I didn't stay here because of the galaxy. If I can change _our_ future, it's enough for me."

It's a collective future, then. The idea alone is enough to make his head spin, with questions more than anything else. He'll have to dig deeper, but first, he'll have to hide her away, lest their efforts end up cut short under his uncle's care. A quick, superficial brush of his senses over the temple and its surroundings is enough to let him know that Luke's yet to return and Ben tugs his companion by the hand in lieu of an answer before she'd had the time to reveal some other detail that should have likely stayed hidden for now.

"Master Skywalker was out for the day," he says as they near one of the empty huts at the end of the makeshift village. "He took some of our newer members to one of the caves up under the mountain peak for a lesson and he _did_ say it could take longer than expected. For the time being, you can stay here." He pushes the door open and waves away the dust covering every flat surface until it's sucked out of the small space.

It's as utilitarian as it gets and Rey, when she flashes a smile in his general direction as she examines her temporary home, looks inordinately pleased with it. _Desert planets will do that to you_. "Does no one check these when _Master Skywalker_ isn't here? Anyone could come in."

"They really couldn't. We're the only people here unless someone is explicitly invited, or, well." Unless they barge into your life from the future through a Force bond that you don't really understand yet. No one had warned him about that particular part of life as a Jedi, but then again, it doesn't seem to be a frequent occurrence. It couldn't possibly be, if it's happening to him. No part of his experience with the Force so far could be described as _mundane_.

"I'll go see how the others are doing," Ben adds as he backs out of the hut. Giving her some space after the day's events couldn't hurt. "And I'll bring you some food. We can find something more permanent – and more secure – tomorrow." It's a good thing that all of the children had gone with Luke – and that they're young enough that he sends them back to their families every now and again – or this could have taken longer than he'd prefer. It's not that he can't handle it, but sorting out soon-to-be-Jedi and their accommodations is much easier when they're around his age. If he didn't know better, he'd think that Luke is already trying to set him up as a fellow Master. The chances of his uncle trusting him that much are slim and it might all be just a test, but it's a great responsibility all the same; one he means to take seriously even if he's a little too thorough at it.

It's not the first time his enthusiasm is lacking in that particular department, but it's been a while since he'd had something significantly more interesting to do. He lingers by the door, unsure how to proceed. It would be so much easier to just bring her back to the main building with him and introduce her to the rest of the students. She wouldn't be so alone then, though if they're in any way similar at all, it likely won't help as much as he's hoping it will.

"I have time," Rey assures him. It's a bit too nervous to sound like the joke she'd doubtlessly been trying for, but it's enough to make him laugh despite the confusion that plagues him. "We'll work it out."

The hope in her demeanour is so infectious that it stays with him as he approaches their small mess hall. Her _smile_ is infectious and she had smiled rather often in their short time together. It makes him feel weightless and unburdened as few things do, as if he doesn't need to keep himself in check quite as much when she's around. If it's the Force doing this to them, then it's a facet of it that he'd never explored before. It's nothing like the strict discipline of the light or the all-consuming hurricane of emotions that the dark often appears to be; it's a grey area, and it's unchained enough for Ben to feel drunk on it.

Who could she possibly _be_? His social circle consists of about fifteen people, all of them living the same life as him, and the idea of that changing should be unsettling instead of exciting. Ever since he'd said his goodbyes to the rest of the galaxy over a decade ago, any unpredictability his future might have held had melted away in front of him, only for it to surge up again now. He doesn't need the knowledge she has to know that Rey had been a surprise for whatever version of him she'd already met – their connection alone would have caught him off guard. Or perhaps it won't, now that he's met her here, if she doesn't succeed in changing the future. Perhaps the Force had already set out his path for him and he would still be the man she had first met; the one with the name he'd found lurking in her head. It's a name he'd thought of a long time ago, back in his less than exemplary childhood, but the other name attached to it is what had caught his attention. _Ren_. Had he, really? _Would_ he?

_No_.

Less than ten feet away from the mess hall, Ben freezes in place.

_This is a new one_. It doesn't feel like Snoke's presence in his mind, or even Luke's, for that matter. It's softer – weaker, almost – but more determined, and deeply rooted somewhere inside him. It's not an outside force like it always has been before. It's _him_, Ben realises. Him from the future, likely. It couldn't possibly work, not without the thread of his lifeline coming undone under the strain, unless—

Unless—

_Unless you're dead_.

_I could be._ It is Snoke this time. It's all just in his thoughts, fuelled by the Force, so it's easy to recognise the different kinds of presence in his head and Luke is never _that_ intrusive; not even when he's doing his not-so-subtle check-ups on his mind. _Rey wouldn't be staying here to try and change everything if she had future me to go to._

The thought of someone coming home to him is more alien than anything else that has happened today, especially given his glaring lack of an actual home in the present. She'd brought a shared history back with herself; something she'd wanted to pass on and make better all at the same time. That's strange, too – having something to pass on. Having someone to pass it on to, potentially.

_I wouldn't get carried away if I were you. The life of a Jedi is always devoted to the Force, as your Master keeps telling you_. The derision in Snoke's voice when mentioning anything to do with his Jedi training is more subdued now, seemingly in favour of the twinge of mockery for Ben himself that he's slowly been learning to distinguish. It rarely happens unless he's being particularly ridiculous about something. It's the first time it's felt unjustified. _Meddling with the past to force the future to go as you please is a ridiculous idea. You shouldn't distract yourself on a whim._

_She wasn't lying about our connection._ Or about anything else he'd found in her memories, really. It's easy, in hindsight, to recognise that unnamed, visceral feeling she'd tried to keep at bay despite the fact that everything else had been so clearly written over her features – grief. Grief and desperation for a life cut too short. She had felt as if a part of her had been severed off and the pain had disappeared almost entirely, leaving only a phantom ache behind. The impression of it all had been a whirlwind through their bond at the time, but it takes shape alarmingly quickly now that he knows it's him she's lost.

It had mattered to her, enough for her to risk turning the flow of time upside down to change it. It's not something a liar does, no matter how committed they are to their cause. Ben isn't too comfortable with sweeping statements about people he barely knows – he couldn't be, given the mechanics and complexity of a mind's inner workings – but he can tell that much.

_It doesn't need to be a lie to be dangerous. Your future in the Order should matter more than the word of a stranger, shouldn't it?_

_She's not a stranger._ She knows him better than anyone else ever has, truth be told. This kind of foreknowledge is a gift and he knows himself well enough to see that he had given it to her all too willingly. It must have been a relief. It certainly is now. _If I've let her into my mind before and the Force kept us connected like this, that means she knows me and I know her_.

She knows the worst parts, too, from what he'd gathered. She knows of his shadow and she'd named it, albeit wordlessly, and she'd _stayed_. Despite his relentless questions and anxieties, Ben finds himself smiling. It does seem like the kind of thing she'd do – by now, he knows a fraction of her too.

Snoke's yet to share his enthusiasm. There's irritation seeping through and it catches fire once Ben reciprocates, but he's not ready to back down. _You haven't let her in **yet**._

_No, _Ben concedes. It's not his wisest choice; letting someone he'd met hours ago try and tinker with the way his life develops from here on, but it's a choice. He'd never really been given one before. Rey hadn't offered him a list of ways she would like things to go apart from trying to steer them both away from danger. If anything, it's the most responsible decision he's ever made._ Not yet. But I will._

The connection closes for the time being and, with his thoughts free of anything the rest of the temple's inhabitants could find unusual, Ben finally steps through the door.

He'd never been good at remaining unnoticed, but the "Ben!" that follows as he plops down in his usual place next to Tai still makes him wince. Their strict schedule during the day demands that they're punctual to a fault and in Luke's absence, he should have known better than to lose track of time. Nearly everyone else had finished with their dinner already and it's just as well, if he's hoping to take some of the leftovers away and remain unnoticed.

Nearly everyone, but not all. Tai nudges him in the side as Ben digs into his food, cold as it is, hungrier than he'd realised he'd become. "What _happened_? Mack said you'd stayed behind and we couldn't get anything else out of her. I thought we'd have to go look for you."

"The routine for today was giving me trouble. I wanted to give myself some more time so I could perfect it." It's not much of a stretch – whatever new exercise Luke sets out for them, he tends to fixate on it until it's flawless. He masters it faster than anyone else, usually; quickly enough to be able to move onto one of his less respectable side projects while the rest of the students take their time. It's those projects that take longer without the direction of someone more experienced and it shows – he'd known he'd done a botched job out of Mack's memory wipe but had been too impatient to do much but distract her from Rey's presence. He'd got away with it this time, but the chances of things staying that way after Luke's return are rather slim. If Rey is still as intent to stay as she seems to be, she might have to end up joining the rest of them in the temple whether it endangers the future or not. Luke would be less than pleased with an unannounced new arrival, but it's far from the worst transgression Ben has inflicted on this establishment ever since their arrival. He'd get used to her sooner or later.

It's not like him to be this hopeful, he knows. It's even less like him to imagine that it'll _last_. But for her sake, he thinks he can manage it for now.


	3. Chapter 3

Even after a year of training almost exclusively in a forest terrain, the woods around the Jedi temple prove to be a challenge. The fact that her new teacher is nowhere near as organised, accommodating, or patient as Leia had been does not help.

"Duck!" Ben calls out – in the last possible second, as per usual – and Rey throws herself out of the way just as yet another one of his arrows breezes right past. "Your reflexes need some work. You have to _see_ the world around you no matter what you're looking at."

It's hard to keep her irritation at bay, along with the bewilderment that goes hand in hand with it – there had never been _arrows_ involved in Leia's set of exercises – but Rey manages it as well as she can. "Is that supposed to mean anything?"

"Would I bother with it if it didn't?"

Honestly, she can't quite tell. From what little she had seen from actual, years-long dedicated Jedi training, it involves a whole lot of talking, the majority of it in the spirit of whatever point he's trying to make now. The sacred texts had been the same, too – peace and balance and the complete abandonment of any attachment to the rest of the world – but for all their preaching, the Jedi had always appeared to be fighters first and foremost, at least to her.

"I wouldn't know." She tucks her lightsaber away – it's a good thing she hadn't taught herself out of the habit of strapping it to her belt while she slept, or it might have disappeared with the rest of her belongings when she'd travelled back in time – and sits down opposite of him, just close enough to be able to peer at whatever it is that he's writing. He does almost all of it by hand, she'd noticed, and the logs from his most recent mission for Luke are no different. Most of what happens in the temple is done manually, from what she'd seen. The students are as in touch with the world around them as they can possibly be, and yet, "I'm not sure you're suited to passing the ancient Jedi wisdom along to the unenlightened. They weren't as blunt, from what I've heard."

"If you want proper Jedi wisdom, I'd have to take you to Master Skywalker. It can be arranged," he adds when she chances an incredulous look in his general direction. "Sooner rather than later, he'll figure out there's someone new here. He's too used to the lot of us – and to the safety of the place – to actually check anymore, but," his voice takes on a sharper edge, "that's Master Skywalker for you. Ever so careful with his subjects, but not as observant as he'd like you to think."

_Subjects_. Rey's not sure if it's mockery she can sense in his tone or just plain bitterness, but it's enough to make her do a double take. Even if she hadn't had the chance to see much from the life at the temple yet – not for herself, that is; the bond allows her a glimpse through Ben's eyes instead on occasion – it's easy to see where the tension is coming from. The only thing that reigns here is the Force, with Luke and his students as its dedicated servants. All their missions are related to the fledging Jedi Order that he's trying to build, all their lives, although shared with one another, immersed in the power they hold and little else. Luke discourages any distraction and Ben is a consistent thorn in his side in that matter. Things haven't fallen apart yet, but Rey can see them cracking at the edges already – the problem, from what she'd gathered, isn't that Luke doesn't fully trust his nephew (though he doesn't) or that he fears him (though he does), but that he doesn't particularly _like_ him. Fear and mistrust Ben can take, but the lack of acceptance is something else entirely. It burdens him, as much as he tries to hide it, and it fuels right into his own irritation at his uncle's stoic resolve about every aspect of their collective lives. She had spent a little over a week in the outskirts of the temple and it's still been enough for her to see the fissures in the surface of everything, spreading like a spider's web, waiting for someone to step out of line to fall apart completely.

And it will, at some as of yet undetermined point in the near future – fall apart, that is. The least Rey can do is prevent it from happening, given that the Force had clearly been kind enough to maroon her here once she'd decided to stay. Since then, their seemingly random meetings in the in-between of their connection had started occurring again, driving Ben to distraction. He can't wrap his mind around it fully just yet, and on her end of the bond, the brief glimpses into his day-to-day life had brought more questions to the surface than they'd had answered.

"You could try telling him before it ever gets to that," she says at last, motioning between them in lieu of explanation at his puzzled expression. "About the— the dyad." It's still so strange; being the one who has all the information at hand while he's as lost as she had been a mere year ago. Being the one who has to do all the convincing instead of letting herself be visited and engaged in conversation whenever the urge strikes him. "He's your family."

"He's my Jedi Master before he's anything else." This is about the only thing in the entire place that he's at peace with, it seems. It's a fact of life, nothing more, and it hurts _her_ all the more for that. "He's forever keeping us away from any influence that could disrupt our training. If that means keeping his students separated from one another too, so be it." A memory, only distantly irritating by now, passes by too quickly for Rey to be able to take it in fully, but it gets the point across just fine, and his gaze suddenly fixes on hers with that undivided attention that she'd got used to all too easily. "You _are_ a student of his, aren't you?"

"Yes." She can't lie to him, or even evade the truth. It's not just that he would know, though that's also an issue, but that it feels _wrong_ in a way that she can't put into words. It's certainly worse than the many times she's tried lying to herself. "No. Not— for long. Most of what I know came from elsewhere." A lot of it had come from _him_ and Ben's eyes light up with interest when he catches onto that before Rey can shove it away. Leia had taught her everything she'd known and had put all of her disjointed instincts into skills she hadn't even thought to pursue before, but that first fight – _I can show you the ways of the Force_, a then-stranger had promised, and the knowledge had poured through the gaping connection between them for the first, but not the last time – had given her more than she'd realised back then. "But I do know him. He's," she must be feeling charitable today, given the disastrous few days she'd spent on Ach-To, "careful."

The assessment gets her a derisive snort in response. "You could say that. No, the fewer people know, the better. There are people here that I can trust. They'd still budge if Master Skywalker asks, though, and if you really want to change the future, he _definitely_ wouldn't approve."

That much she can't argue with. Her one attempt to make past events better in his presence hadn't gone too well, after all. It's an unpleasant enough memory for her to venture into a less dangerous but far more explosive territory. "Your parents, then?" Even if Luke isn't a family to him, she knows that they are. The dyad would be a bizarre concept to anyone, Force-sensitive or not, but Leia would still take it in stride. Han, from what little she had seen of his connection to his son, would accept time travel if it means keeping his family safe. Back then, seemingly an eternity ago on Starkiller, he'd looked ready to do _anything_. "It's not that I can't do this alone, but you—" There's nothing she can say without revealing far too much and so she dodges the topic altogether. "_We_ might need support at the right time."

He'd been completely alone back then; Rey knows that now. With no one and nothing to break his fall, the consequences had been disastrous. If the future must run its course up to Luke's betrayal – if she won't be allowed to change _that_ – then she can make sure he's not left to his own devices.

Ben shakes his head, suddenly closed off and resolute enough for her to know that he won't change his mind unless she tells him the full story. "Not an option. You could tell me what you need." He's studiously avoiding looking at her, but casts a hopeful glance in her direction when she shakes her head. "I'm good at field missions as long as I have all the information. _That_ Master Skywalker would admit to."

"Not an option," Rey echoes. She shouldn't encourage him, but a smile breaks out despite her best efforts and she can see him catching onto it immediately, zeroing in on a weakness to exploit. "I've met them both. Your father wants you out of here anyway. Leia would understand if I tell her—"

"What? That everything she's ever feared is finally going to happen? She knows. _I_ know. Everyone knows. It's a matter of time," he adds when she makes to protest, "I can feel Master Skywalker thinking it too. It's like he's waiting for the other shoe to drop."

He's _right_, Rey realises with a start. That tension she'd felt through the bond, plaguing Ben's subconscious through his daily lessons, is precisely that – the knowledge of how vigilantly his uncle is watching his every move, trying not to aggravate him enough for him to _snap_.

It's another thing she can try and change, difficult as it might be. _His_ mindset, if not Luke's. "That's not what this is."

"Yes, it is." Before she can do anything to stop him, he yanks her lightsaber off of her belt and activates it for long enough to do the same with his own, watching them sizzle far more aggressively than they would have otherwise. Rey's heart flutters at the sight, a terrified sort of anticipation settling in. She can practically _see_ the picture in his mind start making sense. "Do you know what happens to a kyber crystal if you try to heal it after it's been bled?"

She's never managed to hide anything from him; not even back at the start. The admission still feels like gravel on her tongue. "Yes."

"It changes colour." It's like he hadn't heard her at all, enraptured by the revelation. "And this, what I'm doing to it now— it shouldn't be possible. No Jedi that we know of has tried time travel before." He tilts his head to the side, studious as ever. "It must hurt. Not as much as when it cracked, but it _does_ hurt. I wonder—"

"Stop." It's hurting _him_, she can see, but he soldiers on, eyes glazing over with either a vision of his own or an exchange she can't hear. It's another one of his oddities and she might just be the only person who sees it for what it is – his vacant expression at times, usually right before he makes a decision he'd had to reflect a long time on.

"I've strained it so much." It sounds nearly apologetic, but more puzzled, as if despite all his bleakest predictions for the future, he can't imagine the pain that he'd have needed to achieve this. "You did a decent job of fixing it, but the scar is still there. If I've done this, what _can't_ I do?"

"_Stop_!"

Her voice, finally, is enough to break him out of his reverie and Ben flinches away like he'd been burnt, the weapons falling to the ground as he deactivates them. "I was trying to say—"

"I _know_ what you were trying to say." Rey picks hers up, tucking it away before he can do even more damage. "You've made your point. But if it's what everyone suspects, wouldn't they be more willing to help?"

Isn't this what love is, after all? For a moment, she feels outstandingly out of her depth. Staying here, with him, trying to change the course of history, trying to change their personal future – it had felt like such an obvious solution. The realisation that not many other people would go to the lengths that she has if someone they care about is at stake is an uncomfortable one.

"I don't think you understand how this works." _This_, she knows, is everything around them – the temple, the rest of the would-be Jedi, his Master, his life. "I'm never going to see my family again. By the time my training is finished, I'll already have students of my own and when _that_ is done, I might be allowed back into the world as a Jedi Master. By that time, my parents will be gone already. I have to stay." He fiddles with his lightsaber, once again avoiding her lest she sees what she can already sense through the bond. "I have to be prevented. If you know me as well as you say – and you do, I can feel it – then you know that too. Everyone knows that."

"You keep saying that." It's what's being repeated to him over and over; she knows that now. It's what he's accepted as a given for as long as he'd been able to understand what the power he has means for both his future and the world around him. _I have to be prevented_. It makes sense, now, that he'd so easily accepted her accusation of being a monster. No one had bothered to disprove that; not even when he'd been sticking to his best behaviour. "Have you ever tried _asking_?"

"I don't have to." His eyes, when he faces her again, are like black holes; bottomless and immense and infinitely tempting. She'd give anything to see what's on the other side if it kills her; had already made that exact choice too many times before to count. "There's a name in your head."

"Ben—"

"No." He's almost gentle in the way a hunter before a mercy kill is. "No, that's not it."

_Is this it?_ Her head is spinning and she's falling into the abyss he offers, nearly resigned despite her determination. Is this what the change she can offer is; can it only be a catalyst for him to turn even sooner? She should have known. Time and time again, she'd failed in convincing him when in his own mind, he'd already lost. "You don't have to dwell on it."

"It's in your mind, so it's in mine. I have to dwell on it whether I like it or not." She _knows_ the look in his eyes; both the hunger and the invitation that lurks beneath the surface. It's not something he himself recognises just yet, but she's seen it often enough, right along with his stubborn confidence that he has the only right answer for them both. "You think about him when you look at me. Whenever I do something alarming."

"You don't alarm me." It's not a lie. He seems more helpless than anything else; wandering blind between one side of himself and the net, not yet aware that he would have never been forced to pick anything to begin with. Now that she can see the conflict already growing inside him (it might have always been there, for all Rey knows), it's hard to tell, but this might just be the version of him that she'd seen through any mask he'd put on in front of her, back from the very beginning. The _light_ in him towards the end had nearly blinded her, but it had taken so much effort, so much pain. He'd been too drained to survive it for long. The weight of the world had been placed on his shoulders long before that – long before now, too – but it might not be too late to try and push it off. Sometimes, it can only take a word. "_Ben_."

If he'd heard her, he doesn't show it. "It's an old name, that's how I figured out you weren't lying before you proved it to me. I thought of it— I can't even remember when. And then, years later, I met Ren and his knights. I didn't think I'd ever go that far, but everyone else must have seen it coming. No use denying it now." When he faces her again, he's a thousand light years away. "Absence must really make the heart grow fonder."

He can't possibly know. Rey had seen his day-to-day life, both in his mind and through the bond, and no one else even knows that she's here. He's quick and more perceptive than most people had ever given him credit for, though, and she must have been more obvious than she'd thought, but, "You don't know what you're talking about."

"Oh, I think I do. You love him." He says it with enough confidence that she doesn't realise at first that he's talking about _himself_. It's the disbelief lurking underneath that gives it away – despite his lack of knowledge for the future, he can't imagine anyone making the decisions she had made to get here. "That other— that other me. And he's dead, or you wouldn't be here; time would unravel. If that's what you're trying to prevent, he must have been important to you." _Kylo Ren_. He still won't voice it, but it's loud and clear in his mind; this idea that _she_ had planted there. There's an invitation in there too, far smoother and far less desperate than the last few times he'd made it, nearly ten years into the future. It feels more like mischief than the hunger she's used to, as if this is all just an engaging experiment that they can both lean into, no strings attached. He's afraid of himself, so much so that it makes him reckless and it's nearly enough for Rey to take back her earlier assessment. Perhaps she'd like him better as he'd been, after all; Ben who'd cast the dark aside for her but had carried the memory of it. Ben, fully aware of what he's capable of after years of blazing his bloody trail through the Galaxy, stepping into the light all by himself.

Ben, so wrapped up in the Force's newly returned light inside him that he'd dissipated under her touch, taking with himself whatever peace she'd managed to find in the chaos around them.

"You're angry, too," _this_ Ben concedes. He couldn't possibly understand and it makes a hysteric sort of laughter bubble up her throat – for once, it's not Kylo Ren she resents. He, at least, had never left her behind, be it for her own good or not. He hadn't much cared of anyone's good but the power they could yield together. It's not something she should miss, but it's right there all the same, clawing its way out of Ben's carefully calculated judgment of her. "But you love him too."

It's both, damn him, it's _both_. She's done pretending that she can make a difference when it's the same set of angry, inquisitive, daring eyes staring back at her, now in the past and back in the future, the same chaos of darkness and light drawing her into its depths and really, she'd never stood a chance.

"I love _you_."

For once in his life, Ben falls quiet and in the space between them, Rey can feel history twist and shift and finally click into place.


	4. Chapter 4

Luke is onto something.

It's difficult to tell what exactly it is that he knows, even after years of trying to navigate this particular battlefield. He's tentative and tight-lipped at best around all of his students, but Ben tends to bear the brunt of it, given how much more careful his uncle is around _him_. It's a strange line to walk – they're so engrossed in being Master and student that Ben rarely remembers that they're related at all, but Luke treats him with an odd, occasionally unsettling mix of familiarity and the almost cold, non-preferential detachment he offers the rest of the future Jedi here. He's not playing favourites by any means – and if he were, Ben would be nowhere near the top of _that_ list, he's sure – but he treats him with more caution than he affords anyone else and in the end, there's no use in keeping anything from him.

"We'll tell Master Skywalker tonight," he says as he and Rey make their way out of the woods and back towards the Temple. "Not the whole truth, of course, but you should at least meet him. He's starting to catch on and the longer I lie, the worse it'll get."

Rey's expression turns from inquisitive to disconcerted, an uncomfortable sort of avoidance settling into her eyes. It's the look that only ever appears when he talks of his family and he wonders for what has to be the hundredth time just how much she knows. What had the golden, exemplary Jedi master that his mother had handed him over to all these years ago done when his nephew – Rey's Ben – had fallen? Had he been the one to kill him? He wouldn't be surprised, Ben realises to his own dismay – he'd seen nothing to suggest that Skywalker isn't capable of it, and at this point, he can't help but trust Rey's judgement on the matter more than he would his own. If she's uncomfortable, chances are there's a good reason.

_I love you_, she'd said with enough conviction to put even him to silence. It's a ridiculous proclamation – she doesn't even know him, apart from who he seems to be in his future – but he can't _not_ believe her. She doesn't seem to expect a response (not yet, anyway) and instead, they'd silently agreed that they'd have to find a way to make space for her in the Temple – there's no denying now that they both want her to be a permanent fixture here and apparently, the Force is of the same opinion.

"I'm sure it won't be that bad," he coaxes – he can see her decisiveness falter even further the longer the silence between them stretches and whatever the future holds, he can't have this blowing up in his face now. "He's a suspicious man, but he'll accept just about anyone – and anything – under the right circumstances." Ben's own transgressions when it comes to the traditional running of a temple are proof enough, but he can't tell her that. His new old friend is looking at him as if he holds all the potential in the world and it's terrifying, if not as much as he'd thought it would be. It's a look he's been seeing in people's eyes all his life and it tends to bring him nothing but dread, but somehow, it's different with her. Instead of uncertain expectation, he sees calm resolve; the certainty that familiarity sometimes brings. It's something he's always been an outsider to, looking in on this sort of sensation in strangers's eyes when turning to other strangers, but he'd never thought he would live to be faced with it too. Perhaps one day, when he's a Jedi Master, spreading the Order's wisdom from one end of the Galaxy to the other, but the thought of that leaves him as anxious and twitchy as usual. He's here for life, he knows, but it has failed to completely sink in over the course of ten years – that this is _it_, now. Rey's sudden appearance hadn't brought in any sudden peace on that matter; if anything, it had only made him more restless.

Still, here and now, what he thinks of the future assigned to him doesn't particularly matter, unlike Luke. She seems to pick up on that soon enough.

"I'm not sure how right my circumstances are. When I met him for the first time, he wasn't particularly responsive. Well," she backtracks under his alarmed glance, "things were different back then. Will have been— different."

Ben ducks his head to hide the grin that breaks out despite his best efforts. It must be confusing, time travel – he wouldn't know – but the way she scrunches her nose in distaste is a more charming display than anything he's ever seen. He hasn't seen much, granted, but he's still better travelled than anyone else on this particular world barring Luke and there's a thrill in meeting someone so like him, in spirit if in nothing else. Everything about her situation as it currently is frustrates her as much as it fascinates her and it resounds so clearly in his mind that it's almost too good to be true.

"I took a reroute through Jakku on my way here," he says at last as they reach his hut and he nudges the door open. There's no such thing as personal space when it comes to a future Jedi so none of their sleeping quarters have locks, but common courtesy should allow them some privacy. "Master Skywalker already knows – he checks my flight data every time I land after I ran away a few years back." It's an embarrassing incident to think about even without Rey's barely suppressed smile, but he can't exactly fault her for it – it's still an immense relief that she finds him amusing rather than threatening, impulsive decisions and all. "He's waiting for me to bring it up and tonight, before dinner, I will. Then he can introduce you to the rest of the Temple when you join us for dinner."

"You have this all planned out." She sounds pleasantly surprised, so he nods, glad that that it had come across as less overbearing than it had felt. "Anything else I'll need to know?"

_Too much for us to have the time for it now. _Ben shrugs in lieu of a response. "We make our own food and since you've done nothing but lightsaber practice today, we'll have to share a meal."

From what he can tell, she can live with that.

~.~

"Master Skywalker." His voice echoes in the near-empty building and Ben tries to remain undaunted as he skips up the stairs to where his uncle usually meditates before dinner. Interrupting meditation is not among his best ideas, but there's really no other way. He's hell-bent on being done with this today and if it takes disturbing his peace, then so be it. As predicted, there's little acknowledgment apart from a hum of greeting. "I have— news. About the mission."

"I thought you might." The Jedi Master cracks an eye open and nods at him to come closer. He steps towards the centre of the room, hesitant as he'd last been in his childhood; apprehensive in the face of the unknown. "Out with it, then."

Ben takes a seat by the window so that they're facing one another, almost equals from an onlooker's point of view, he suspects. It makes him bolder than he might have been otherwise. "It went well. Very well – the cave you spoke of is exquisite. Some of the artefacts you've already seen, and the rest I'm still trying to dislodge from the Grimtaash." The Force is a powerful ally, but less so when it means that shoving something out of his beloved ship takes more effort than it had taken to push it in. "But you knew that from my report. When I set the course home, I felt—a pull. It seemed wise to follow it and it took me to a desert world – desert and nearly deserted, with a few exceptions. The pull was even stronger there, and I saw—"

His voice dies. It's not even a lie – he's landed on Jakku with the intention of making his story as believable as possible and he'd felt her there; much younger, much less aware, but unmistakably Rey. The course of time had tumbled and turned around him and he'd fled before he'd managed to ruin everything with an ill-placed intervention at the wrong place in the wrong time, but he had known.

When Luke speaks again, he's far more cautious. "What did you see, Ben?"

This time, he looks his Master in the eye. "There's been an awakening."

~.~

Dinner is a quiet affair. It's something Luke would rather achieve far more frequently and for far better reasons, Ben suspects, but it must be a blessing when compared to the usual chatter all the same. He pushes his plate in the space between him and Rey as soon as the food is done and they dig in, the tension thick and heavy in the air like it hasn't been since the first night the rest of the students had arrived in the Temple.

He pries another bit of information about his new friend in the meantime – she's not used to being around other Force-sensitives. Her emotions bleed all over the place and it's almost suffocating even when he carefully shuts himself off of their bond, so there's no doubt that the rest of them feel it too.

Tai, naturally, is the first to speak.

"So, Rey," he begins, valiantly ignoring the way Master Skywalker is glaring daggers in their general direction – more specifically Ben, truth be told, though no one on either side of him is safe – and leaning over the table so that he can see her better, "You've been here a week, Ben says. How did you manage to hide your trace?"

"I've been wondering that myself," Hennix says, his usual curiosity shining through the cautiousness. Ben can't exactly blame him – they'd never had visitors from anyone like them before who hadn't also been a child, and none of Luke's students had arrived as adults. None had been brought in by Ben himself, either, and he knows there's something illicit about it even after the length they'd gone to in order to convince everyone that he'd just happened upon her during a mission. "An untrained mind is usually the loudest one to be heard at a place like this; it always happens with the children."

"Could be that I'm not a child," Rey theorises. She plays clueless rather well and Ben allows some of his amusement to bleed through their connection. He can't voice his approval, but anything that mystifies the most laced up of his classmates – and, more than anyone else, Luke – is worth risking his head for. It's not likely that anyone else can feel the bond anyway; he might as well indulge it.

"Could be," Tai agrees, still picking at his food. "But still, _nothing_? I felt Ben the moment he arrived."

He's got an excuse for _that_, at least. "That's different. Our minds are bridged."

"They are?" Rey, who had given him the unmistakable impression of trying to sneak out of the room as quickly as she can with as few witnesses as possible so far, freezes in her place. "_That_ sounds fascinating."

"It's not that complicated." She'd already been tense to begin with, but Ben can feel a different sensation take root now; far weightier and much more unbearable. _Doubt_. "When two Force-sensitive beings are close to one another – physically, too, but emotionally most of all – it can happen sometimes. It's not—" _the same as what I have with you,_ he adds mentally and pushes the thought in her general direction, judging himself successful when she winces at the feeling, "—anything out of the ordinary."

"Oh." There's something territorial about her that he likely shouldn't be enjoying as much as he is, but Ben knows better than to toy with her. The last thing he wants to do is hurt her, even inadvertently, and he's not particularly well known for his tact, so it's all he can do to keep quiet. As if she can feel some of his trepidation bleeding through their connection, Rey makes to stand. "It's been lovely meeting you all. Master Skywalker," she adds, lowering her head in something too close to a bow for Ben's comfort – had she never been in a temple before? "I'm glad we could talk. This is still very new and really exhausting, so I was wondering—"

"You can go." Luke had clearly decided to put her out of her misery. "We were just finishing up as it is." There's the familiar sound of the low, long benches creaking as everyone gets to their feet. "Ben can help clean up."

It's typical, he thinks, not moving from his own spot – _everyone_ is put out of their misery but him.

"Master Skywalker—" Tai makes to protest, but Ben shakes his head. _It's no use_, he mouths back at him and he watches both his dyad-mate and his friend disappear through the doors of the common room and towards the safety of the outside world, the rest of the students trailing out after them.

"I'm sorry," he says as soon as they're alone, though he already knows it won't help. "I should have told you sooner, Master. It was all my idea. It's not her fault; whatever you told her—"

"I didn't tell her anything," Luke interrupts before he can get to the end of his carefully prepared speech. "Nothing reproachful, if that's what you're afraid of; I _know_ it wasn't her fault. What I want to know is _why_. Why hide this from me? She has a much better chance if she's being trained by someone more experienced than you are at present."

"It wasn't my intention to train her." It's not entirely a lie, though Ben isn't sure if his uncle can tell – Luke narrows his eyes the way he always does when he knows there's more to a story and is waiting for him to give in. "It's just that— I told you what I felt. There was something different about her. I didn't want anyone to know at first because she was scared and had more questions than _anyone_ knows how to answer and," he hesitates, and it's never been true for anybody before, not when it comes to him, but, "and she trusts me completely. I didn't want to betray that." _Or let go of it, for that matter. _With Rey, everything seems so easy – they don't need to walk on eggshells around one another, no matter how much of their collective power they'd already borne witness to. Ben can see it in her as clearly as he can feel it in himself – she's tired of carefully cleaning after every inconvenient thing she feels and the short-lived freedom that she'd been afforded during their several days together had been more than she'd managed to scrap together in the last year or so. He'd gathered enough information to know that she had been alone before the Force had sent her to him, but before that, there had been something else – expectations and faith and enough pressure to last her a lifetime.

She would never have to feel like this, no matter what Luke has to say about it, Ben vows to himself. She would never have to hide again.

_She's never going to be like you._ The voice is familiar and vicious as ever and Ben's knuckles go white as his hold around the edge of the table tightens. _You can fool yourself as much as you like, but there's no one else who understands. Skywalker certainly can't, nor do any of his students; this stupid girl will be no different. How much does she know about you? Nothing at all. Once she does, she'll end up afraid or angry, just like the rest of them._

Snoke is wrong about her, Ben realises with a startling rush of clarity. He's never resisted such convictions before, not since the day his parents had left him here, any love they might have felt – any they might still hold for him – tainted by an amount of worry that had felt truly incomprehensible. Over the years, he had come to understand. This is just how things are. This is who he is, barely hanging on to the right side of the Force, waiting for the other shoe to drop and for everyone to turn away from him, justified in what they'd always known: that they'd been stupid to even _try_. He'd been rotten to the core since the very start; it's only natural that he should be left as a lost cause.

He's not barely hanging on anymore. Not with someone to pull him over the edge.

Luke sighs, but doesn't protest, seemingly unaware of the whirlwind in his mind. He had never seen, to Ben's relief and terror; had never comprehended just how bad things could get. If he had, he might have been finished with whatever it is that he's done to him in Rey's time years ago. "You mentioned that you felt something. Did it start with Rey? Was it only her?"

It's so, so quiet. His mind feels like it does only after vigorous meditation, unburdened and bursting with life in a way he can't quite manage the rest of the time. His body, the cage that it usually is, is so light that he could fly, Force-aided or not.

"No. A part of me feels like she's been there all my life," even before she could have been alive at all, he thinks, given some of the calculations he'd already made, "and I'm trying to understand why that is, but no. There's always been—something else, too." He's not going to use the name. If there's one thing Luke has taught him, it's that giving things a name makes them more powerful than they had ever needed to be. It's why Snoke had introduced himself as early on as he had, Ben suspects. "A darkness. I couldn't understand it at first, but it's always been there."

"Ben—" Whatever his uncle is about to say will be a lie, no matter how comforting, and it's easier to cut him off than to endure the inevitable.

"It's true. You know it is; everyone does. I don't know why or how, or why I'm the one it chose, but it's as old as I am. Older, likely." He's not conceited enough to think that every force of the darkness in the Galaxy is there to make his life miserable, but after so many years, it doesn't seem quite as unbelievable as he would have anticipated. And still, still, it's quiet in his mind now, as if Snoke had depended on him staying quiet. If he had known how much power his own voice can hold, Ben might have spoken up far sooner. "And I _know_ you said that it's nothing out of the ordinary – powerful light, powerful darkness, as my mother said you told her – but it's not— I don't _want_ it. I've tried to fight it for so long, but there's so much telling me that I should do otherwise, that I have no choice— you couldn't imagine it."

The world outside of his body is silent too, now; deafeningly so. Luke might have never brought it up otherwise, but he doesn't need to – Ben knows fear when he sees it, and he's been seeing it in his Master's eyes for years. "I know."

"I don't think you do." He can't remember the last time he'd spoken to him, or anyone, quite as openly as he does now. He can't remember if it's ever happened at all, but the sudden rush of independence, no matter how long it's going to last, gives him just the push he'd needed for the words to start pouring out. "Rey, on the other hand— she _does_ know. She makes the light easier to get hold of, somehow. I think I make her light easier too."

It's a ridiculous notion and he has a difficult time believing that it's come out of his mouth at all, but it's the truth – Rey's truth in the very least, from what he'd seen in her mind. The other, potential version of him had always pushed her to face herself in each and every aspect and she'd decided to return the favour, both back in the future and here in his present. It's not something he can grasp just yet, not when he can _feel_ the darkness clawing at his heart in every waking moment, but he's willing to trust her for now – the voices that haunt his mind had been there far longer and had understood far less than she had in a handful of days.

"All right," Luke relents, finally, and Ben's breath leaves him in a wave of relief so overwhelming that he could cry. It's another lifted weight; his uncle's trepidation towards him hasn't vanished and it's not likely that it ever will, but it's a _start_. "We can talk more about this tomorrow, when she's here, too. I'd like to know how advanced her skills are; if there's anything I can teach her along with the younglings or if I should just keep her with the rest of you and knight you all when the time comes."

"Thank you, Master Skywalker." Nothing tangible has changed, but for once, he's willing to have hope. "Can I—"

"You can go." Luke seems as eager to be rid of him as Ben is to dart out of the common room and back towards the huts and so he doesn't wait to be told twice before he does just that, heading straight for the one Rey resides in without a second thought. Chances are, she can feel his elation through their bond – she's more skilled in delving into it than he is, given how much longer she'd experienced it – but the urge to see her is still stronger than any other, even more so because of the fact that, for the time being, at least, there's no other presence in his mind.

Just her.


	5. Chapter 5

It's completely dark outside by the time Ben comes back.

"Rey?" She'd been half-asleep, the monotony of her hut relaxing her and finally ridding her of some of the anxiety that plagues her at the thought of Ben and Luke all on their own back in that mess hall.

She's more relieved than she cares to admit that he's here at all, half-afraid as she'd been that a direct confrontation would push Luke down the path he would take in her own timeline, and springs up from the pile of covers that had ended up doubling as a makeshift bed, narrowing her eyes to make out his silhouette in the darkness. A few candles spring to life with a quick wave of Ben's hand, and—

And he's _glowing_. His signature in the Force is as bright as it had been after she'd come back to life, but he's nowhere near as exhausted; has been through nowhere near as much pain. His joy is infectious and Rey grins up at him before he's even started talking, smile only widening once she hears what he has to say.

"I told Luke. Not everything," he amends at her horrified expression. "Not about you coming from the future or the whole truth about Snoke, but—I told him enough."

The name alone sends her into yet another bout of disorientation about the time she's been sent to. It's a precious knowledge and one she knows she can't ask for directly without breaking the universe apart, but she would be allowed a few pointers, surely?

"You've met Snoke already?" She hadn't heard the whole story of how it had happened – had never had the _time_ – but the fact that it had been so early on is unsettling, if not quite as much as Ben's shrug and his next admission.

"Not in person, no. We've never been physically in the same space." He frowns, as if the thought of the possibility alone is particularly upsetting. Rey can't blame him. "But he's been there for as long as I can remember. I thought I was imagining things at first, but it's been years now; I've talked to him far too many times to count. Master Skywalker could always tell, I could see it. He'd never admit it and he didn't understand quite what was happening, but he did know." Ben plops down on the hard floor, head propped on his hands as he lies down. "It felt good, telling him. I never would have had the guts to do it, otherwise, but he asked about you and it just wouldn't stop pouring out."

"I can imagine." It's a lie; as much as she'd like to sympathise, she can't even begin to comprehend the burden he must have carried all those years. She waits, breathlessly quiet, to see if he'll say anything else – share another memory she'd never thought to unearth out of him before – but instead, he turns to her, smile just as bright, if a little warmer now; subdued in its peace.

_I love you_, Rey wants to say, but bites it back once again, more delicate than she'd ever been with anything in her life. He had heard it already and might even be starting to understand, but the last thing she wants is to be yet another still mostly unknown force pushing him this way and that.

He's the first one to break the silence. "Thank you."

It's enough to startle her out of her reverie. "What for?" She can't help it; she scoots closer, mostly under the pretence of keeping quiet – there's only so far a whisper can travel – and settles down again. He's close enough to touch, close enough to kiss, and it feels far easier to allow herself to think of it now than it had been back on Ahch-To. A year ago and several into the future, every moment of intimacy they'd shared, nearly until the very end, had been tainted by a nearly unbearable shame as she had done her best to deny the draw she had felt, but there's no such thing holding her back now.

"For being here. For reminding me that I have a choice. The Force sent you, I know," he interrupts before she'd even had the chance to speak, "but you're still so— Snoke _hated_ it when I thought about you." So, on a near-constant basis, he pushes towards her through the bond, still tentative but growing surer of its certainty with every passing day. It's not difficult to see where he's coming from, if he thinks it's too good to be true – by the time she'd realised what the Force had gifted them with, Rey had been simultaneously relieved and disbelieving. She'd been alone for so long, listlessly grasping at a family that she had deep down realised would never come and there he had been, hunched over in her small hut, face awash with the grief _she_ had felt. It must feel the same way to him now – finally, he doesn't have to endure any of this alone.

A vindictive thrill runs through her at the knowledge that Snoke knows, too, even this early on now that she's arrived. He had been intimidated enough by the bond to try to both exploit it and lie to his apprentice about its origin in a last ditch attempt to wring everything he had out of him. It had been the final straw, just as much as her being in danger, that Ben had needed to drive a lightsaber through his Master's side and the giddy, raw joy that had rushed through him from the freedom of it still echoes in her mind sometimes. "He did?"

"So much." It sounds just a little bit like gloating on his side, too, his full mouth twisting into a derisive smirk. "And I thought— it was stupid," he adds, almost an excuse, before Rey nods at him to continue. "But it reminded me of the way he speaks of Tai. Anyone who makes Snoke _that_ furious is someone I might want to keep around, I've noticed."

It's a better assessment of Snoke's general presence in his life than any she's ever heard him make before and a tremendous improvement of anything that she'd witnessed back on _Starkiller. The Supreme Leader is wise_, he had said then, voice trembling with some terrible mix of pain and love and anger and anguish as his father had approached him without a moment of hesitation, all the truths that _this_ Ben had already grasped spilling out on his son's unwilling ears. His entire life, Snoke had relied on that same belief - that same isolation - to keep him compliant. It had been too flimsy a scheme to last long once Ben had realised that he'd been forced into his solitude and a well-placed intervention, Force-fuelled as it might have been, had been the only thing he'd needed to overcome it.

"It's your life," Rey says at last, still maintaining that careful balance between vague and demanding that had carried her through her stay at the temple so far. "And your choice. If you don't want to listen to his _advice_ any longer, you don't have to."

"Of course." It sounds so far-fetched when he says it, as if the prospect is as alien to him as the idea of a constant presence in your mind is to her. "Easier said than done. It's not just him, it's—" He clams up all of a sudden, regret and shame flashing through his eyes. It's heartbreaking, the fact that he's never said these things to another soul in the Galaxy, but a privilege all the same; knowing that she's the first person he'd ever trusted with himself. In this life, he barely knows her, but the dyad must have taken care of that rather quickly, just like it had the last time – a part of Rey feels as if they've been intertwined with each other since the first breath either of them had ever taken; as if they'd sank into this connection ever since the first explosion that had breathed life into the Universe. "It doesn't matter what it is. It's gone, for now. For the first time in—" _In my life_, he finishes, gaze downcast, his long lashes throwing shadows over his cheeks. Rey reaches out without a second thought, tracing his cheekbone with the tips of her fingers, delighting in the way his eyes fall shut under the caress.

"It wasn't your fault." It's a small comfort and he's unlikely to believe her, but there's nothing else she can do. "It still won't be, if it happens again."

"You can't know that." A series of events, disjointed but forming an unmistakable pattern in his mind, flash through their connection and Ben turns away from her inquisitive gaze once again, eyes suspiciously bright and voice rough when he speaks again. "No one can."

"But I do. I know you." She's no good at this; Rey knows that too. She can be about as honest and tactless as he had always got around her and it might not be what he needs, but there's little else she can offer. "Better than you knew yourself, sometimes, I think. You were always so sure, back then, that there was no turning back. It was too late by the time I got around to convincing you. I don't want it to be too late again."

She can't do this, that much she knows. She can't stay here and watch it all unfold, no matter what direction his life takes. She can't stand back and watch him fall again. If time and space themselves fall apart for the sake of preventing that, then so be it. There are lives that she has to safe – that she must have been sent here to protect, really – and she's far too tired of pretending that one of them doesn't matter disproportionately more than all the others put together.

His eyes fly open when she untangles his hands from the fists they make and takes them in her own. Has he killed yet? It doesn't _feel_ like it. When he'd tried to feed into the dark side that had fuelled him once he'd went with Snoke, every life had been both a burden and a temporary relief; she had felt it through the bond whenever he had fought. His father's death had torn him apart more thoroughly than anything else he'd ever done, but all that warmongering in faceless crowds, all that violence, had scratched the itch far more effectively. He had never quite fed on the lives he had taken, but the jolt of the disturbance in the Force had been a high he'd chased more than once. It had felt better than pain, self-inflicted or otherwise, better than anger, better than fear, and it had excited him in a way he would have been mortified to admit in front of her even back then, when his blunt insistence had brought her to tears more than once.

He's not much different now, but he's in less pain, at least. He's less convinced of his dark Master's teachings, too, and, given that he doesn't particularly trust Luke to begin with, the place where guidance should be is left blissfully blank. The only thing she can do is nudge him towards the freedom she knows he craves more than he ever has anything else.

"It might very well be too late." There's a different edge to his voice now; one that she knows altogether too well. _It's time to let old things die_, he had said, resolute and ready to grasp his new life in two greedy handfuls, and it breaks her heart just as much now. "I doubt it's really over. I don't think it ever will be."

It's the same despair she has heard from him before, but, "I'll be here until you're sure. I'll be here after that, too." It's not like she has much of a choice to begin with, stranded out of time as she is, but it's what she would have wanted anyway; what she had hoped for against hope in her worst days on Tatooine until the Force had caved and given it to her. "I've fought this before; in both of us. _For_ both of us. I can do it again."

"Rey." His voice still sounds choked up and he's so, so close. She can feel the desperate elation in his tone and his soul and it catches fire when it finally reaches her, resonating through both their bodies. "Can I—"

"Yes." She doesn't have to hear the rest of the question to know what he wants; to be sure that she's about to have him, keep him, this time perhaps for good, her last memory of him resonating through her yet again. One of his hands tangles in her hair as he decisively brings her closer through the last few inches that separate them and then his lips are on hers, hard and demanding and hungry and everything she had hoped for all at once. "Yes."


End file.
